Sicily to Matera

So we farewelled Sicily just before the heatwave weekend struck!

my boarding school was closely linked with the Bronte sisters, so this photo had to be included.

Secured hut on Etna..the bus stop!

Etna from above Randazzo...taken at the conclusion of my hill efforts training day

there were 2 places in Messina where we could board a ferry and we opted for the closest one, although we'd probably arrive 30 mins early.  Signage for this dock was spectacularly poor/missing..the sort of signage for people who already know where to go! After circling x 3 we finally got there only to mistakenly go through the trucks' ticket office..ie I had to get out the car  and pretty well do  the high jump to give the man our ticket.  We then circled around again, nearly boarded the wrong ferry and  finally turned out to be the only car amongst 12 trucks, 6 of which were tankers..we felt dwarfed.

Arriving in Matera we followed the directions on the web site via my smart phone and arrived at totally the wrong place! I phoned the owner to say we'd arrived, thinking we had and finally  20 minutes later he turned up...the delay was because  he couldn't reply to me as my phone number is a UK one.  Actually had he known it he could have but  he needed to  chop off the +country number bit. I have a sneaking suspicion that we are not the first to go to the wrong place as he knew where to find us!

outside/verandah sitting area

a well stocked kitchen/dining/sitting room

Anyhow the house is perfect..AC, free wifi, 2 bedrooms, TV for TdF watching and the kitchen was stacked with loads of food, drinks and welcome gifts. So...along with it's location, this house joins Ulle's in Cortina and Isabella's in Feltre as being THE most welcoming of all we've been to, ticking ALL of the boxes below.

Points are given for:
1. correctness of advertising..ie 2 bedrooms being 2 bedrooms, flat screen TV, AC, free (and generous bandwidth) WiFi
2. location...not too remote
3. etcs in the kitchen...condiments are the bare essentials we expect..who travels around with salt, pepper, oil and vinegar FFS? but other stuff is nice too..eg some fruit, bottles of water/juice/milk etc etc
4. and finally no dramas about having our bikes inside

I've learned to closely note the pix on the website..especially what is NOT shown. also what is promised..ie if alot is made of the provision of a hairdryer then what is not  provided!!  however as is evident from our Torre del Greco experience, I'm still learning!

One of the places we rented expected us to bring our own TV!!! truly..I kid you not.

Matera:  http://www.italyheaven.co.uk/basilicata/matera.html

cave houses carved into the rock and lived in by the poorest right up until  the 1950s..now a tourist attraction and some are expensive BnBs.

Our photos don't do it justice..not only due to our crap photography skills but also due to the glare of the  sun on pale coloured rock at close to midday:

one of the bigger renovated houses

looking down at the various levels - unrenovated houses

chimneys in the foreground of houses on the lower level

churches abound and this huge sasso/rock  houses one of them

doorway in the foreground to one of the cave  houses

caves on the far side of the Gravina  ravine

there's a foot bridge down there somewhere!

even a panoramic shot can't get it all in

Sicily

Our house/apartment near Catania is a two bedroomed, air conditioned, free internet, smart TV dream place and with a washing machine too!.  A perfect place apart from the  initial poor reception of Rai 3, the channel that has the Tour de France on and a rather strange smell in the kitchen! however until the TV was fixed  we watched the tour on live streaming  and ignored the smell😉.

The ferry over  was smooth sailing in all ways..no need to book, one every 30 minutes, for us it was just a 10 minute wait on arrival, and not overly expensive.  We managed to get within coo-ee of the house before having to ring for guidance and then after being shown around went out to the nearest supermarket to load up for a week of healthy eating.

We had no special plan for the week apart from Etna..first riding and then later driving and going up as far as we could (definitely NOT the 5 hour walk though!).  Oh..and avoiding Taormina!!

So map studying took place and the next day, up bright and early, we set off.  close to 1 hour later and 500m higher we finally got to the base of the climb, by which time I was already somewhat tired and told Alex, I'd not make the top.  He was to go up and find me on his way down, which is exactly what happened.

 The next day we drove up to the highest point we could, took the funicular, then a bus and finally a walk around a crater.  This particular crater is 20 years old,with 20 metres of volcanic debris; the steam emitting from it in places makes for a great  hand warmer!  The most recent activity (2017) was of a lesser amount and that debris is already cold right through.

by the time we got to the far ridge we were in a bit of a white out

the volcano equivalent of graffiti or leaving a padlock

different colour=different minerals

seen from the road...on the way up/down

Etna seen from  the north side north:

bit of snow still there and locals use the stone for walls,houses..everything

the following day we went to Castelmola..sadly Etna was under clouds so we didn't get the reported "eye popping" views.  Castelmola is above Taormina..the latter being a tourist trap++ great for visiting in either the early hours of the day or, as I did years ago, in early May

Drapia then on to Sicily

BnB near Drapia

Drapia old church

snail mail I guess!

I'm more than just a bit confused about this....

N+1 jealousy

and so  across to Messina, Sicily

Torre del Greco to Paestum

I was grateful to leave Greco del Torre..it's grotty streets, inappropriate apartment, scarred cars, noise and busyness but the next couple of hours led to an increase of grey hair, worry lines and panic-caused twitching and breath sucking in.  Yes..you guessed it...we drove around the Amalfi coast road.

When I said "we" drove, I actually mean Alex drove and I suffered.  Actually he enjoys and is good at this sort of driving...switchbacks, twisty narrow roads and all in the company of a zillion other drivers...all crazy of course and another zillion tourist buses. I, on the other hand, do not enjoy and am not good at this sort of passengering!!  Someone described it as being similar to the Great Ocean Road in my home state of Victoria...nope it's more like the foot trail up any steep mountain pass.

We managed to get through without any extra scars on the car but since it was so busy, also without managing to find a  place to park the car at any of the photo opp spots and so all our pix are taken out of the window while moving.

Realising we needed to leave Torre del Greco  earlier than planned, I booked 3 nights in a BnB at Cappucio near Paestum.  We were lucky to find a nice place with 2 separate rooms, AC and internet.  The BnB was pretty new as the family had recently fixed their large house up with the ground floor being part a granny flat, part BnB.  It was close to a good hilly ride and also Paestum.  On day 1 we went out for an evening meal but then got the fixings and ate in our rooms.

the town on this hill is where I got to on my ride

on the road..what is it?

Breakfast for me is always cereal and a lot of coffee.  In our 3 BnB stays provision of cereal has been ...well ...different!

At Anghiari despite being offered cereal, it never showed!
At Paestum..there was 1 type of cereal (I think it was cereal) but I think it was anticipated you put it into the tub of yoghurt...there was really no other option.
At  Drapia there were 3 types of cereal including Muesli but no bowls and no milk....??!!

Well..travel does broaden the mind and give you plenty of things to write/talk about!

It also points up that while we spend alot of time here in Italy, staying in apartments doesn't get you inside Italian family culture at all.  The Paestum BnB certainly did and that family will be forever  bamboozled by our eating habits including not liking mozarella buffala, salami and pizza,(and definitely not for brekky!) and especially our  total lack of interest in going to the beach!

Paestum was just down the road and we went for our 3rd day of culture...that's it then...enough already!!  As a very young child I suffered terminal boredom visiting Roman remains (my father's hobby) while staying with my aunt in Northumberland and so my threshold for tolerating ancient ruins is very low.

running repairs

ancient and modern

Vesuvio, Herculaneum, Pompeii

Vesuvio
Alex climbed by bike, I drove..we met at the car park...he could have ridden another 3 km up to the end of the bitumen  but declined!....can't imagine why😀.  Maybe, just maybe because it was a 13km  unrelentingly uphill climb right from the door .... 12% at it's steepest.  Good surface especially once  you left the city confines.

After the carpark there was a 3km walk or bus trip followed by the real deal.  We were early so didn't get too swamped by those pesky tourists!

DON'T

looking out over the bay of Naples

Since we were so early, after a rest and something to eat we went to Herculaneum which was just a 6 min drive away.

Herculaneum is more compact than Pompeii and therefore less tiring. A lot remains undiscovered under the modern dwellings of Ercolano.

cause in the background, effect in the foreground

places to keep food warm...not toilets!

The next day we went to Pompeii

cobbles anyone?

restoration work

And the end result..very stiff legs as neither of us is used to so much walking!

Monte Cassino, and our apartment at Torre del Greco

Approaching Naples, I was more than somewhat disconcerted to see a number of cars apparently held together by sellotape!  (well that's a bit of an exaggeration but not by much... oh well ok...there were 4).  If your car is unblemished you probably bought it yesterday!

it's there..just a bit hard to see on this pix

Either I was tired or perhaps getting closer to a big metropolis on a Saturday there was just more traffic on the road, but I did NOT enjoy driving into the Naples area.

The 4 hour drive from Anghiari would bring us to our accommodation in Torre del Greco about 2 hours early , so we stopped at Cassino to visit the Abbey there which was the object of a major WW2 bombardment .  As we drove up, the abbey looked so elegant and modern, I wondered aloud if we were in the wrong place. We weren't but I had to buy a postcard showing the effect of the bombardment and it's  current state to be convinced.

Then it was on on on getting more fraught as we neared our destination....on a rather grotty looking street. A quick response to our phone call and we were ushered in to our 2 ROOMED apartment. Kitchen, Dining table and TV were all in with the double bed and with the bathroom off it. The 2 single beds are in the entry room!  Choice of bedrooms is turn and turn about so it was Alex's turn to get the better room...dammit!

TV just above the photographer, kitchen stove and sink behind and to the left  bathroom to the extreme left

We made an instant decision to leave early...so Tuesday not Friday.

However it's  moments and places like this that live on in our memories when other normal places do not. They might challenge us at the time but we look back on them with a variety of emotions.

Amusing moments started immediately:
1.  with Alex being unable to get out of the bathroom. Took him a good increasingly panicky 10 minutes and we now don't  lock the door.
2. The shower hose/rose connection leaks so much very little water actually gets to the shower head..so water sprays everywhere = flood!

3. Lucky we weren't  ravenous as the pasta water took  30 mins at least to boil on the highest setting.
4. OK so I'm  short and Alex isn't  exactly tall but the plate shelves are so high I can't   and Alex can only just reach them!

 at full stretch my hand reaches halfway to the top shelf

 ALL is not doom and gloom though..there is AC in both rooms, free internet, a Smart TV and the water is hot..when we can direct it onto our bodies! It is also well placed being  on the road to both Vesuvius and Herculaneum.

We went out for a pizza at a local pizzeria and look who was at the next table..hard to tell I guess..but it was a baby rabbit.

Feltre to Napoli

Once I got round to checking out how long this would take (8 hours), I realised that there had to be a half way halt.  The revised plan was to leave on Friday, drive about 4 hours and do the next 4 hours on Saturday (AKA lemming day...when the roads are filled with tourists fleeing from 1 location to another).

Alex suggested somewhere near Arezzo so after research I opted for Anghiari and little did I realise what a gem I'd opted for.

 Firstly, our bnb was in a small commune of 10 families  up in the hills and about 6km away from Anghiari ; the main house used to be a monastery and is even older than where we stayed ~~1000 year old.  It is a  place where pilgrims stayed ie it was on a "pilgrim's way" from Assisi to ? The next stop on the pilgrim's way was a castle on a hill visible from  there but  rather a long way away!

the old monastery

our bnb

found around the back!

Secondly... how lucky were we as we just  happened to arrive on Anghiari's  Palio night when the town celebrated a war they won in mediaeval times (any excuse for a party!)

Anghiari from afar

Palio commemorating a mediaeval battle

Trumpeter

bagpipes!!

Not only did we have incredible luck to arrive on this particular weekend but the town itself is so full of photo opportunities that  I ran my camera's battery down to empty!

The only downside of the entire experience was that the next day I left a parcel of perishables in the bnb's fridge...dammit!